Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete

CHAPTER X.

1 Two wives of one man, each have a son sick. 2 One of them named Mary, and whose son’s name was Caleb, presents the Vir­gin with a hand­some car­pet, and Caleb is cured; but the son of the oth­er wife dies, 4 which oc­ca­sions a dif­fer­ence be­tween the wom­en. 5 The oth­er wife puts Caleb in­to a hot oven, and he is mirac­ulous­ly pre­served, 9 she af­ter­wards throws him in­to a well, and he is again pre­served; 11 his moth­er ap­peals to the Vir­gin against the oth­er wife, 12 whose down­fall the Vir­gin prophe­cies, 13 and who ac­cord­ing­ly falls in­to the well, 14 there­in ful­fill­ing a say­ing of old.

THERE were in the same city two wives of one man, who had each a son sick. One of them was called Mary, and her son’s name was Caleb.

2 She arose, and tak­ing her son, went to the La­dy St. Mary, the moth­er of Je­sus, and of­fered her a very hand­some car­pet, say­ing, O my La­dy Mary ac­cept this car­pet of me, and in­stead of it give me a small swad­dling cloth.

3 To this Mary agreed, and when the moth­er of Caleb was gone, she made a coat for her son of the swad­dling cloth, put it on him, and his dis­ease was cured; but the son of the oth­er wife died.

4 Here­upon there arose be­tween them a dif­fer­ence in do­ing the busi­ness of the fam­ily by turns, each her week;

5 And when the turn of Mary the moth­er of Caleb came, and she was heat­ing the oven to bake bread, and went away to fetch the meal, she left her son Caleb by the oven;

6 Whom the oth­er wife, her ri­val, see­ing to be by him­self, took and cast him in­to the oven, which was very hot, and then went away.

7 Mary on her re­turn saw her son Caleb ly­ing in the mid­dle of the oven laugh­ing, and the oven quite as cold as though it had not been be­fore heat­ed, and knew that her ri­val the oth­er wife had thrown him in­to the fire.

8 When she took him out, she brought him to the La­dy St. Mary, and told her the sto­ry, to whom she replied, Be qui­et, I am con­cerned lest thou shouldest make this mat­ter known.

9 Af­ter this her ri­val, the oth­er wife, as she was draw­ing wa­ter at the well, and saw Caleb play­ing by the well, and that no one was near, took him, and threw him in­to the well.

10 And when some men came to fetch wa­ter from the well, they saw the boy sit­ting on the su­per­fi­cies of the wa­ter, and drew him out with ropes, and were ex­ceed­ing­ly sur­prised at the child, and praised God.

11 Then came the moth­er and took him and car­ried him to the La­dy St. Mary, lament­ing. and say­ing, O my La­dy, see what my ri­val hath done to my son, and how she hath cast him in­to the well, and I do not ques­tion but one time or oth­er she will be the oc­ca­sion of his death.

12 St. Mary replied to her, God will vin­di­cate your in­jured cause.

13 Ac­cord­ing­ly a few days af­ter, when the oth­er wife came to the well to draw wa­ter, her foot was en­tan­gled in the rope, so that she fell head­long in­to the well, and they who ran to her as­sis­tance found her skull bro­ken, and bones bruised.

14 So she came to a bad end, and in her was ful­filled that say­ing of the au­thor, They digged a well, and made it deep, but fell them­selves in­to the pit which they pre­pared.